Dear Friends in Christ:
It will soon be time for us to celebrate the 4th of July! Recently I heard an “oldie” on the radio. It was “People Got to be Free” by the Young Rascals.
The title says it all. To live a life trapped, limited, restricted, without the ability to choose for ourselves, that is hardly life at all. People got to be free.
Our marvelous nation was founded on an experiment and the conviction that freedom is essential in order for humans to live fully.
I think freedom is basic, because that’s the way God made us. In a moment of wonderful grammatical redundancy, Saint Paul insists that “For freedom, Christ has set us free!” Of course, Paul was talking about freedom from guilt, sin, death. But freedom is freedom, and you can’t believe in one freedom, and then deny another. Our wonderful God wants us to be free, free to choose, free to live, free to be.
That brings us to a sobering reminder. There are many – too many – in our nation who have little economic freedom. Born into poverty, they suffer within the walls of missed opportunities and are constrained to a life of few choices.
I don’t know about you, but when I celebrate that our God made me free, when I sing about a flag that waves “o’er the land of the free,” my enjoyment of that freedom is lessened knowing that I have brothers and sisters that don’t know the freedom in Christ, or that don’t know the economic freedom I enjoy.
This 4th of July, let’s celebrate, but let’s also dedicate ourselves to an inclusive freedom so that in our lives we can “from every mountainside, let freedom ring.” God is with you,
Pastor Gary Dreier
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